Eh stuff...and plagiarism
Feb. 19th, 2019 07:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkat1. ganked from maia -- The History of the World in Admin -- as someone who has spent most of her working life in the administrative and operations departments of various businesses of varying sizes, this is fascinating, and most likely true. Evil Marketing people have ruled the world for too long now -- fire their butts and hire a good public administrator.
I think this relates to the US and Brexit. Although, it should be stated that one of our Administrative Assistants/Clerk Typist is a heretrosexual male.
2. Netflix finally got around to cancelling The Punisher and Jessica Jones.. Hardly surprising.
3. What is it with "Indiana Jones" and DW today? Smartbitches had a question about an Indiana Jones like romance novel and someone else had a post about an Indiana Joney style sci-fi novel. Is something in the water? I remember writing a really bad novel about an heroine fashioned after Indiana Jones during WWII back when I was a teenager. Think a female Indiana Jones with a male damsel and male fatal. I flipped the genders.
4. ah... Another Plagiarism Allegation against another romance novelist -- why is it always genre novelists who get either targeted or reported for doing this? Most infamously it was Janet Daily who was accused and later confessed to plagiarizing Nora Roberts novels -- she overcame it before she died at 69.
(Honestly I don't think it would be that hard -- Roberts is a paint-by-numbers writer, it's not like her style is distinctive or anything. Be like plagiarizing James Patterson.) Then of course there was the The Cassandra Clare debacle -- where the writer allegedly plagiarized a Draco fanfic and got banned from fanfic.net as a result (not to worry -- she went on to write a best selling series "Shadowhunters" based on that plagiarized fanfic. LMAO.)
The latest culprit is Cristiane Serruya. And she's copying from Tessa Dare, Courtney Milan and Lisa Keyplas, among others. And fans found it. Apparently there's a CopyPaste app that can search a book and find phrases that are lifted from another one? Folks in the digital age -- don't plagiarize, people can catch you and humiliate you on the internet for kicks.
Again, I ask, why is it always women and in the fantasy and romance genres?
Hmmm..curious to see if there are any other cases -- I did a search.
* What Are Famous Examples of Plagiarism
Note some will surprised you. And they aren't all women, and none of them appear to be romance novelists. Huzzah! I sort of knew about Alex Haley, but thought that had been resolved in his favor...guess not?
* Still More High Profile Cases as chronicled in the Boston Globe
Talks about James Frey, among others -- more modern examples.
* Literary Plagiarism Scandals - goes into literary scandals, some of which got disproved.
Per the last link? Plagiarism isn't that easy to prove.
For one thing -- you have to prove they copied something "original" and more importantly? "DISTINCTIVE". Most writing isn't exactly distinctive. (I know it's my biggest complaint about 90% of the books I've read -- it's not distinctive, it reads the same as all the others. And the romance genre is rather notorious in this regard as is the mystery/thriller and historical/non-fiction genre. Fantasy and sci-fi less so.)
Note: "Wild. Sexy. Love. They had it every night. And every day." - is not original. But: "Buffy had wild, sexy, love, every single night and every day with Peter. Poor Petey, who heaved and swayed with lust for her. To the extent that all Petey could think of was Buffy, Buffy, Buffy. Her thighs. Her throat. Her...well everything really. His friends thought he was right bonkers of course. But there you go." Is original, albeit badly written by yours truly.
I remember that from an intellectual property, copyright and trademark course I took in law school. Also tracking it down and removing it from the internet in regards to text that is...shall we say hardly "distinctive" is a lot easier said than done. (I hated doing it. Trademarks are harder -- it's really hard to prove a trademark is distinctive. Keep in mind what I had to work with -- I was working for a library reference publishing company. We were trademarking things like HW Wilson Art Index, or just World Biography. Which uhm, isn't exactly distinctive. They let us do it -- the US Copyright and Trademark Office really doesn't care as long as you pay them, as the poor nitwit who spent quite a bit of money trying to trademark the word "Cocky" found out. They also don't refund. So it pays to determine if you actually have a viable trademark first.) And people wonder why I ran screaming from rights and permissions to construction contracts and procurement?
I also remember more than one fan kerfuffle over some fanfic writer who had decided to ahem, lift whole passages from another writers fic into their own. Ozymandias from the Buffy fandom got crucified when it was discovered he was doing it with Xander/Buffy fanfic. The Xander fandom went after him with pitchforks. And then there was the individual who stole from Nautibitz -- I know because she asked me what to do about it, and I told to consult fandom lawyers, but that there is relatively little a fanfic writer can do, outside of outting the person. Why? Well, your fanfic isn't protected under copyright law. Sorry. It's not. You're using someone else's work. Legally speaking -- no one cares. In fact, in some circles, they may consider what you are doing copyright infringement. Which is why the whole plagiarism thing happens more with fanfic than anything else.
It's rather easy to unintentionally plagiarize. You read something, forget you read it, but the phrase sticks and it ends up in your book.
As T.S. Eliot wrote, in the essay “Phillip Massinger” : “Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal; bad poets deface what they take, and good poets make it into something better, or at least something different.”
Some writers avoid reading other works similar to their own -- in order to avoid this problem. But that's sort of like shooting yourself in the foot -- because reading makes you a better writer. The trick is to develop your own distinctive style. It took me years -- but I've developed one. People usually can tell it's me now. Snarky, conversational, with a touch of slang. Also I will wax poetic. Reading helps you to come up with your own style. Try things out.
But, if you read too much of one writer or one group of writers, you may without realizing it begin to mimic their style. For a while -- I was mimicking Joss Whedon -- this was back in 2002-2008, when I was "obsessed". I grew out of it eventually.
Best to read a variety...less likely to fall into the mimic trap.
And if you want to get good at writing dialogue? Seriously -- read plays, lots and lots of plays, screenplays, teleplays...
It is pretty clear that one of the biggest divisions in the Brexit debate (and it is essentially still a debate) is between people who have some kind of grasp of the operative principles of admin and logistics and those who don’t. Long before the referendum was held it was clear that nobody was publicly asking the people who were actually going to have to, well, Do Brexit (i.e. the civil service and its auxiliary agencies, mostly) for their opinion on the feasibility of what was proposed. Or as it turns out even asking them privately, but that’s another post.
The reasons certain people don’t understand the operative principles of admin and logistics are anecdotally not hard to find. They are the same throughout any organisation that does anything that involves committing things, any kind of things for any reason, to paper. Usually, though not always, these people are men, and these people are senior, and these people are older. The reason they don’t know how to do a mailmerge, or how long it takes to accurately enter 387 marks into a spreadsheet, or what process might be involved in removing something from a website, is because they were mid-career when such things became a possibility at all. Quite probably even at an earlier stage the more privileged among them were never expected to get their heads round equivalent things. It’s just not a habit. No one has ever told them or expected them to figure out how long it takes to actually get stuff done. As a result, they confuse something being simple in its ends and nature with its being easy and quick.
Like many who have worked in various forms of logistical and administrative support services which deal with simple matters, I have learned to dread the (usually) senior man who starts a sentence with “Can’t you just…” That “just” is usually doing about an hour’s work which the man sincerely has no idea won’t happen spontaneously, without any agency at all. After all, for them, it does. Room bookings and meetings fly unbidden into their diaries, words assemble themselves magically upon website pages in such a way as to make them appear to best advantage, spreadsheets complete themselves and turn up from somewhere, and when their continued brilliant trajectory is flagging and in need of sustenance, catering appears. Everything that involves counting, understanding, summarising, categorising, directing, sending, informing, supporting – all the little ings that support the final strategic active verbal formulation “I have decided that…”, all this happens elsewhere. In this, of course, their professional lives are just an extension of the home lives they have long been accustomed to, in which someone else typically does most of the thinking and most of the donkey work. The phrase for this on Mumsnet is “facilitated men”. It goes without saying that the more privileged people are, with maleness as only one form of privilege, the more facilitated they are likely to be.
I think this relates to the US and Brexit. Although, it should be stated that one of our Administrative Assistants/Clerk Typist is a heretrosexual male.
2. Netflix finally got around to cancelling The Punisher and Jessica Jones.. Hardly surprising.
3. What is it with "Indiana Jones" and DW today? Smartbitches had a question about an Indiana Jones like romance novel and someone else had a post about an Indiana Joney style sci-fi novel. Is something in the water? I remember writing a really bad novel about an heroine fashioned after Indiana Jones during WWII back when I was a teenager. Think a female Indiana Jones with a male damsel and male fatal. I flipped the genders.
4. ah... Another Plagiarism Allegation against another romance novelist -- why is it always genre novelists who get either targeted or reported for doing this? Most infamously it was Janet Daily who was accused and later confessed to plagiarizing Nora Roberts novels -- she overcame it before she died at 69.
(Honestly I don't think it would be that hard -- Roberts is a paint-by-numbers writer, it's not like her style is distinctive or anything. Be like plagiarizing James Patterson.) Then of course there was the The Cassandra Clare debacle -- where the writer allegedly plagiarized a Draco fanfic and got banned from fanfic.net as a result (not to worry -- she went on to write a best selling series "Shadowhunters" based on that plagiarized fanfic. LMAO.)
The latest culprit is Cristiane Serruya. And she's copying from Tessa Dare, Courtney Milan and Lisa Keyplas, among others. And fans found it. Apparently there's a CopyPaste app that can search a book and find phrases that are lifted from another one? Folks in the digital age -- don't plagiarize, people can catch you and humiliate you on the internet for kicks.
Again, I ask, why is it always women and in the fantasy and romance genres?
Hmmm..curious to see if there are any other cases -- I did a search.
* What Are Famous Examples of Plagiarism
Note some will surprised you. And they aren't all women, and none of them appear to be romance novelists. Huzzah! I sort of knew about Alex Haley, but thought that had been resolved in his favor...guess not?
* Still More High Profile Cases as chronicled in the Boston Globe
Talks about James Frey, among others -- more modern examples.
* Literary Plagiarism Scandals - goes into literary scandals, some of which got disproved.
Per the last link? Plagiarism isn't that easy to prove.
For one thing -- you have to prove they copied something "original" and more importantly? "DISTINCTIVE". Most writing isn't exactly distinctive. (I know it's my biggest complaint about 90% of the books I've read -- it's not distinctive, it reads the same as all the others. And the romance genre is rather notorious in this regard as is the mystery/thriller and historical/non-fiction genre. Fantasy and sci-fi less so.)
Note: "Wild. Sexy. Love. They had it every night. And every day." - is not original. But: "Buffy had wild, sexy, love, every single night and every day with Peter. Poor Petey, who heaved and swayed with lust for her. To the extent that all Petey could think of was Buffy, Buffy, Buffy. Her thighs. Her throat. Her...well everything really. His friends thought he was right bonkers of course. But there you go." Is original, albeit badly written by yours truly.
I remember that from an intellectual property, copyright and trademark course I took in law school. Also tracking it down and removing it from the internet in regards to text that is...shall we say hardly "distinctive" is a lot easier said than done. (I hated doing it. Trademarks are harder -- it's really hard to prove a trademark is distinctive. Keep in mind what I had to work with -- I was working for a library reference publishing company. We were trademarking things like HW Wilson Art Index, or just World Biography. Which uhm, isn't exactly distinctive. They let us do it -- the US Copyright and Trademark Office really doesn't care as long as you pay them, as the poor nitwit who spent quite a bit of money trying to trademark the word "Cocky" found out. They also don't refund. So it pays to determine if you actually have a viable trademark first.) And people wonder why I ran screaming from rights and permissions to construction contracts and procurement?
I also remember more than one fan kerfuffle over some fanfic writer who had decided to ahem, lift whole passages from another writers fic into their own. Ozymandias from the Buffy fandom got crucified when it was discovered he was doing it with Xander/Buffy fanfic. The Xander fandom went after him with pitchforks. And then there was the individual who stole from Nautibitz -- I know because she asked me what to do about it, and I told to consult fandom lawyers, but that there is relatively little a fanfic writer can do, outside of outting the person. Why? Well, your fanfic isn't protected under copyright law. Sorry. It's not. You're using someone else's work. Legally speaking -- no one cares. In fact, in some circles, they may consider what you are doing copyright infringement. Which is why the whole plagiarism thing happens more with fanfic than anything else.
It's rather easy to unintentionally plagiarize. You read something, forget you read it, but the phrase sticks and it ends up in your book.
As T.S. Eliot wrote, in the essay “Phillip Massinger” : “Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal; bad poets deface what they take, and good poets make it into something better, or at least something different.”
Some writers avoid reading other works similar to their own -- in order to avoid this problem. But that's sort of like shooting yourself in the foot -- because reading makes you a better writer. The trick is to develop your own distinctive style. It took me years -- but I've developed one. People usually can tell it's me now. Snarky, conversational, with a touch of slang. Also I will wax poetic. Reading helps you to come up with your own style. Try things out.
But, if you read too much of one writer or one group of writers, you may without realizing it begin to mimic their style. For a while -- I was mimicking Joss Whedon -- this was back in 2002-2008, when I was "obsessed". I grew out of it eventually.
Best to read a variety...less likely to fall into the mimic trap.
And if you want to get good at writing dialogue? Seriously -- read plays, lots and lots of plays, screenplays, teleplays...
no subject
Date: 2019-02-20 03:47 am (UTC)It's some sort of psychological thing where when you notice something, suddenly it's everywhere. Like the time I read about whale sharks and then later that day I heard about them on Dora the Explorer, or that hypermobility cat that popped up just after my recent hip pain.
I forget the name of it, but now that I've told you about it I'm sure I'll read three articles on it within the next week.
Though if it's any consolation, only half the book is Indiana Jones-y. The rest of the time she's doing a convincing impression of Han Solo, except with EVEN MORE SCUM AND VILLAINY.
no subject
Date: 2019-02-21 01:50 am (UTC)t's some sort of psychological thing where when you notice something, suddenly it's everywhere.
LOL! In this case it was like one post after another...and both posts had left out the author and title. (The SmartBitches one was hunting a book that had this sort of story in it...). And I thought...okay..WTF?
I've also had ...and this never fails to amuse me, two to four posts with the exact opposite opinion on a television show episode or movie. One post will hate it, and post right after will love it. And I'll burst out laughing.
no subject
Date: 2019-02-21 07:45 am (UTC)I get weird anxiety issues about sharing the things I like and I also am worried about causing similar issues in others.
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Date: 2019-02-23 01:10 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-02-23 01:12 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-02-23 02:15 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-02-23 02:20 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-02-20 08:26 pm (UTC)I read about that plagiarism case as well -- I loved the excuse that it was the ghostwriter's fault, as if someone was so well known and so busy already they could just farm it out without ever reviewing it. Of course, they might well not realize it's plagiarized if they never read other romance novels.
no subject
Date: 2019-02-21 01:43 am (UTC)I loved the excuse that it was the ghostwriter's fault, as if someone was so well known and so busy already they could just farm it out without ever reviewing it. Of course, they might well not realize it's plagiarized if they never read other romance novels.
Yep. It is rather funny.
I just read through all of it. SmartBitches is highly entertained. They freely admit that the romance genre has it's ...shall we say issues? We all admit it is a guilty pleasure for a reason.
Apparently the ghost-writers were given a MS and tried to fix it. I'm guessing the writer of the SmartBitches piece is correct and CS used a software program - in this case Fiver. I know they are out there -- I've seen them. And romance novels are considered an easy and lucrative hobby. (It isn't. That's a fiction.)
It gets back to what we were discussing previously about how poorly edited these books truly are by the current industry. Genre isn't edited at all. And genre writers can't really afford the higher quality editors/fact checkers. The good ones -- do go out and hire a good line-editor and work on their craft.
It is also why the romance and mystery/thriller genre gets such a bad rap. Because there's a lot of paint-by-number writers out there using software or ghost-writers to make a quick buck and get the prestige as a novelist.
It's why the romance community polices this so closely. I don't blame them.